1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to processing systems as may be used in system on integrated circuits and related methods.
2. Description of Related Art
As is known, integrated circuits are used in a wide variety of electronic equipment, including portable, or handheld, devices. Such handheld devices include personal digital assistants (PDA), CD players, MP3 players, DVD players, AM/FM radios, pagers, cellular telephones, computer memory extensions (commonly referred to as thumb drives), etc. Each of these handheld devices includes one or more integrated circuits to provide the functionality of the device. As an example, a handheld FM radio receiver may include multiple integrated circuits to support the reception and processing of broadcast radio signals in order to produce an audio output that is delivered to the user through speakers, headphones or the like. Many such integrated circuits include a processing device that executes a sequence of instructions that are stored in memory.
These integrated circuits operate from a power source such as a battery or an external power supply. An interruption in the power source, caused by a low battery condition or disconnection of the external power supply, can cause the handheld device to hang-up, crash or otherwise malfunction. The need exists for an improved system for solving this problem, that can be implemented efficiently in conjunction with an integrated circuit.